Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Pelikan M1005 or: Time for Orange - yet again!

On most days I'm not perfectly sure what my favorite color is. On other days I just know it's orange.

It's also the perfect color for autumn to lighten up those gray and stormy days - so after I've shown you Iroshizuku yu yake and and Montblanc "Ink of Joy" last year here's yet another orange ink, the (sadly discontinued) Caran d'Ache Saffron.

Pelikan M1005 Demonstrator with Caran d'Ache Saffron

I've had that M1005 Demonstrator for a while but haven't used it too much, mainly because it comes with a rather limited range (F, M, B) of full rhodium plated nibs. I ordered it with an F but then it seems I'm not really an F nib kind of girl.

So I decided to "frankenpen" it with one of my regular M1000 nibs so I
could get to use my gorgeous reground and crisped up BB, 3B or O3B. This
is the awesome 3B: great line variation, wet, responsive and "soft" as
is common for the M1000 size nibs. Nib work has been done by John
Sorowka.

It's hard for me to overlook such mismatches usually but it's not so bad this time. There's a lot of rhodium plating on that nib anyway and it matches alright with the orange ink adding warm color to the insides of barrel and section.

I have two demonstrator pens, this one and a TWSBI (not counting the semi transparent and somehow quite demonstrator-like Omas Extra Lucens), but somehow I've never gotten around to putting orange ink into any of them until now. Most orange inks truly are amazing for transparent pens. Saffron almost looks blood red. I haven't heard of it staining anything either.

Pelikan M1005 Demonstrator with Caran d'Ache Saffron

Quote by Frank Herbert from the "Dune" series.

I haven't tried an orange ink which I didn't like - except maybe for Stipula Zafferano which also looks very nice but is just too light to be easily readable.

Caran d'Ache Saffron is great in every respect: easily readable, offers great shading and flow properties. The color is a bright orange lacking the "burnt" aspect of yu yake or Noodler's Apache Sunset but is not as highlighter-ish as Montblanc's "Ink of Joy". If you love orange and have the chance to snatch up a bottle: do it before they're gone for good!

8 comments:

Could you please tell me a little bit about your experience with John Sorowka?

I'm hoping to ask his help in repairing (actually rebuilding) a Parker Duofold nib but I'm nervous because the pen belonged to my grandmother who died 18 months ago. I've already had one unsatisfactory experience with Parker direct, who just advised me to buy a new nib (for nearly £200, which is more than the pen currently costs on Amazon!)

Hi Alex,Sorry to hear about your grandmother.Hmm, the pen sounds like a complicated case! I have to admit I've mostly sent pens to him for nib regrinds, flow problems, slightly bent tines etc. - I've never had a broken or more seriously damaged nib *knocks on wood*. His work has always been great and he's very friendly and quick to deal with. I would probably send him some pictures of the nib beforehand and ask for his opinion.

Montblanc Ink of Joy, which is quite bright and cheerful. Love it for signing a birthday card.Noodlers' Aapche Sunset: "crazy beautiful", according to ethernautrix on FPN, and I agree.

I might like to try some darker oranges, inching towards something 'burnt'. Somewhat related, I am also curious about Montblanc's Leonardo ink, supposedly a red chalk. It might provide a good contrast with some blue inks.

I am also very much in love with M1005 demo, which I bought 3 in total in case I happen to drop and break one. You truly captured the beauty of the pen. I think M1005 is by far the most beautiful demonstrator pen produced in modern days. I also very much taken by Oma's Extra Lucens, I may get one of them next.

Glad you enjoyed the review. 3 M1005s - wow! I only have this one so let's hope I'll never wreck it. ;) That one has been my daily writer for journalling for the last weeks and has been through the pictured filling of Saffron, another filling of Montblanc Ink of Joy (still not taken with that one very much) and now is filled with my newly arrived Herbin Orange Indien which is also a great color but not translucent so doesn't look that awesome in the barrel. What nib do you have in yours?One day I'd like to own an Aurora demonstrator but that's somewhere fairly low on the list.

The Extra Lucens is a great pen. Lucens celluloid has been around for a while so if you enjoy the pattern/color more than the shape of that particular edition you might even be able to save some money there.

Hi, sorry I come back to this post so late. Among the 3 M1005s I got F, F and EF nib. I used to write more on cheap copy paper and fund the EF and F worked best for those occasions. Fortunately, I have a two-tone Binderlized IC Broad nib for fun writing. Aside from the high quality plastic they used on this pen and the sliver tone, I also like the simple cap without an inner cap to block the view of the nib inside.

I also enjoy using orange ink for my M1005, I have Pelikan Edelstein Amber in it. The orange looks great with the demo!

Upon further reading your blog, I realized we actually share the same admiration on some other pens, here are the pens I also have:

Pelikan 800 Tortoise, 600 White TortoiseOmas Ivory color in Milord size - the one on mine has the chased pattern, it is a society pen, but looks very much the same as yoursOmas Arco BrownOmas Extra Lucens - I got the vintage ones, will get the LE later